Alfred Osborn Pope Nicholson (August 31, 1808 – March 23, 1876), was a lawyer, newspaper editor, banker, and politician from Tennessee. A Democrat, he was twice a US Senator from that state.
Biography
Nicholson was born near Franklin, Tennessee, in Williamson County. He attended the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, graduating in 1827. He studied law and was admitted to the bar in 1831, opening a law practice in Columbia, Tennessee. He edited the Western Mercury, a paper then published in Columbia, from 1832 to 1835. He also served in the Tennessee House of Representatives from 1833 to 1839. In 1840 he was appointed, on an interim basis, to succeed to the US Senate seat vacated by the death of Senator Felix Grundy. He served in that office from December 25, 1840, to February 7, 1842. From 1843 to 1845 he served in the Tennessee State Senate, moving to Nashville during this period. He edited the Nashville Union from 1844 to 1846. From 1846 to 1847 he served as a director, and then as president, of the Bank of Tennessee. He owned slaves.[1]
In 1859, Nicholson was elected to the US Senate by the Tennessee General Assembly. He served from March 4, 1859, to March 3, 1861, when he withdrew from participation in the Senate in anticipation of Tennessee declaring secession, which occurred the next month. Later in 1861, he formally resigned, as did all other Senators from Confederate states. However, fellow Tennessee senatorAndrew Johnson, a Southern Unionist, was the only U.S. senator from a Confederate state in rebellion that did not immediately resign upon learning of his state’s secession.
